Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Annnouncing - almost a month into it - the Travelling PicStitch Blog Hop! I learned about this from a blogger I follow, and when I went to the information page, I discovered that one of the dates in November was open. So I asked to be "stop" on the blog hop, and now I am!

Here's what's going on:
1. You take a picture from your travels.
2. You select fabric using the color palette of the photograph.
3. You create an English Paper-pieced block with the fabric
4. You post about it in your blog! I'll be posting mine on November 17

Palette Builder is a great site for taking a photo from your computer and creating a color palette. It's easy to use, and produces images like this:

Colorado wildflowers

Go to Laura's main post about the bloghop for more information. She has a list of all the posts so far, and all the rest still to be posted. Have a great time going through all the links - there have been some wonderful photos and blocks so far!

Sunday, October 21, 2012

While we were in Colorado this summer, I didn't do ANY Modern Monday or Traditional Tuesday blocks. I didn't take any of the "modern" fabric with me, and wanted to just wait until I got back and get all caught up. Today I finished the last block, and am now ready for tomorrow's Modern Monday block 55.

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

I'm one of those people who names her sewing machines. My Featherweight is named Jessie. My hand crank is Gertrude - a good old-fashioned name. Today, I acquired Carla. Carla is a Babylock Grace. My favorite quilt store, which used to be called the Quiet Mouse, went out of business over the summer while I was in Colorado, and reopened last month as Cherry Berry Quilts. The new owners have discounted their sewing machines, and got a great deal on this one. It's my first machine that has a stitch other than the straight stitch. I just got tired of not having a zig zag, or a blanket stitch, or any others. This one has 40.

I set it up today, learned how to fill the bobbins and thread the machine, and finished up a couple of Block Lotto blocks. I learned that I need a 1/4" foot (well, "want" is more like it) and while I'm at it, I'll get some more bobbins. But I really like her!

We got back from Colorado last Wednesday; I've been spending a lot of time in the kitchen and doing some shopping and getting organized. One of the things I needed to do was go through 3 months' worth of mail, which included some blocks from swaps.

First, I've gotten all the blocks now from Boomerang 7.0.

from Christina C

from Susan C

from Ruth B

from Sara V

from Mikayla A

from Andrea S

from Carolyn R

Next, I have the Block Swap Adventure blocks I received for July and August. I asked for bright-colored stars, traditional or wonky, on white solid or white on white.